The Walt Disney Company

Emma Fraser - P1

P1(a) - Ownership:There are many different departments in the Walt Disney Company and each have separate jobs. Robert A. Iger, the CEO and chairman of the company has played a key part in the system since joining the senior management team in 1996, he acquired the purchases of Pixar, Marvel Studios and Lucasfilm. Andy Bird plays a part as a Chairman for the Corporate division and manages Walt Disney international, whilst Bob Chapek is the Chairman of the parks and resorts in the Business Unit. These are just 2 examples of some of the chairmen at the Walt Disney Company and the list goes on, taking into consideration how many departments they have across the world, for example, Alan F. Horn is the Chairman of the Walt Disney Studios, whilst Leslie Ferraro is the ‘Co-Chair of the Disney Consumer Products and Interactive Media and President, Disney Consumer Products’. There is also a Board of Directors, there are many directors within this board including, Robert A. Iger, Susan Arnold, John S. Chen and Aylwin B Lewis, many of them been dedicated to the company for many years.

P1(b) - Operating Model:The main areas in which Disney operate in are Media Networks, Products, Amusement Parks, Internet and Direct marketing and Studio entertainment. Disney is said to be a scalable dream factory, this is because the factors within the operating model can constantly keep making them money with every new character or film they come up with. They currently have 11 Theme Parks around the world, including 47 resorts in North America, Europe and Asia, with another currently under construction in Shanghai. They also have Disney Cruise Liners, a Disney Vacation Club with 13 properties and more than 200,000 member families. Consumer Products from Disney are created in the masses, with more than 350 stores worldwide, they are always providing consumers with high-quality products. Many of the toys, books and merchandise created come from the range of films Disney have create dover the years, some in collaboration with other studios such as , Marvel, Lucasfilm, Pixar animation and many more. Disney focus on creating characters which will be legendary and be instant classics, this ensures that even years after their release, products of the characters from those movies will still be getting sold, such as Beauty and the Beast, Toy Story, Cinderella, etc. In 2016, they have introduced ‘Disney Life’ which is way you can get all Disney entertainment materials in one place for £10 a month, this has proven popular as people are using phone and tablets everyday, as well as for entertaining children, this has allowed Disney to invade another platform.

They split their entertainment sector into 4 parts, Live Action, Feature Animation, Pixar and Lucasfilm, different movies and characters will come from each sector which will go on to make them money through selling products with the characters on. Disney look at characters and stories as though they are brands and will try to constantly create brands to ensure they keep up their income.

P1(c) – Products:Today, Disney has a numerous amount of Television networks, such as Disney Channel, ESPN, A+E Networks and ABC Family, it publishes merchandising, music and theatre divisions and owns and licenses 14 theme parks around the world. As well as being a conglomerate, they also own a number of subsidiaries such as, Pixar, Disney Channel, Disney XD, Disney Store and many more. Disney have interest in the majority of Media areas, they have a radio station, called Radio Disney, the have Children’s Magazines, a television network and the obvious film outlet. The television networks that Disney own is the ABC Television Network. This network branches out into many different genres, including sports and family, and as well as this they own ESPN and Disney Channels Worldwide. Whilst Disney now own the company LucasFilm since 2012, which created the Star Wars franchise, they also own other subsidiaries which have created many box office hits, such as Marvel, which is still growing today with releases such as Deadpool and Doctor Strange. Other subsidiaries in which Disney own include Pixar, which have brought us children's classics such as Toy Story and a Bugs Life, as well as Walt Disney Studios/Animation Studios which have released films including Snow White, Dumbo and Bambi.

P1 (d) – Market Position:Disney are certainly Market Leaders, with two of films they’ve released this summer, Ant-Man and Inside Out, already with a total gross $176 million and $352 million (statistics as of 11th September 2015). These kind of figures are a normal occurrence for Disney and will usually follow with a sold-out merchandise notification. For example, Frozen, released in 2013, became the highest-grossing animated film ever to have been made, any children took a liking to this film and the merchandise is everywhere, including an unbelievable 3 million sales in the Princess dresses from the movie in North America alone. Disney also own 6 theme parks in which, in 2014, hosted approximately 134 million guests, making Disney Parks the world's most visited theme park company, ahead of the second-most visited rival Merlin Entertainments. It is by far the largest Disney business segment by employee headcount, with about 130,000 of Disney's total number of 180,000 employees as of 2015.

P1(e)- Competitors:Being at the top means there will be plenty of competitors and Disney certainly does, Comcast Corporation being their 2nd competitor, Disney’s Market Capitalization, for 2013, was $134,256, whereas Comcast’s Market Capitalization, for the same year was $134,921. Whilst beating Disney’s Market Capitalization in 2013, Disney’s Asset Turnover for the same year was 10x more than Comcast’s. Other close competitors consist of Time Warner Inc ($63,077) and Twenty First Century Fox ($79,796). Comcast is the biggest paid TV provide in the US with about 22 million video subscribers for its core cable division, however Disney compete against this by owning the ABC Network, which also incorporates ESPN, ESPN being worth $40 million alone. Disney own a subsidiary called Marvel, which produces many super hero franchises such as The Avengers and Iron Man, however rival company Warner Bros. own a subsidiary called DC Comics, which also produce Superhero films including the more recent Batman V Superman and Suicide Squad. This competition between companies often causes a split in audiences, with some claiming Marvel is better than DC or DC is better than Marvel.